Team at MIT Invents Process to Shrink Objects to Nanoscale Sizes

team at mit can shrink things now

It sounds like a project straight out of science fiction, but the technology is real and could signal that a paradigm shift in electronics and lenses is on the way. It's not a shrink ray, but a team at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has come up with the next best thing. 

Researchers at MIT announced this month that they've invented a process that "shrinks" objects to nanoscale - or smaller than what people can see using a microscope - using a laser. 

The process is known as "implosion fabrication" (what a cool name) and could be applied to a variety of industries, from developing better cell phone camera lenses to creating nanoscale electronics or even robots. 

"There are all kinds of things you can do with this,” Edward Boyden, the Y. Eva Tan Professor in Neurotechnology and an associate professor of biological engineering and of brain and cognitive sciences at MIT says. "Democratizing nanofabrication could open up frontiers we can’t yet imagine."

The process doesn't run on Pym particles, instead, researchers found that by using a very absorbent material commonly found in diapers and placing it in a solution that contains fluorescein, they could essentially create a structure using laser light. Then, researchers attached materials such as metal, DNA or even a tiny "quantum dot" particles to the structure. 

MIT Shrinks particles down to size

Finally, they shrink the structure by adding an acid which blocks the negative charges in the polyacrylate gel so that they no longer repel each other. That causes the gel to contract and "shrink" the structure down to size. 

The team came up with the idea after Boyden and his students tried adapting a technique that their lab developed a few years ago to make high resolution images of brain tissue. The process known as expansion microscopy, involves placing the tissue into a hydrogel and then expanding it. 

When the team reversed the process, they found they were able to create large-scale objects embedded in the expanded hydrogels, and then shrink them down to nanoscale sizes - or up to one 1,000th of its original size. 

Daniel Oran, one of the paper's lead authors compared the process to film photography, a subject he's intimately familiar with. Before this project, Oran worked as a trained photographer. 

"A latent image is formed by exposing a sensitive material in a gel to light. Then, you can develop that latent image into a real image by attaching another material, silver, afterwards," said Oran. "In this way implosion fabrication can create all sorts of structures, including gradients, unconnected structures, and multi-material patterns." 

The best part? The miniaturization technology doesn't require any kind of crazy lab equipment. Boyden says many research labs are already stocked with exactly what they need to repeat the process. 

“With a laser you can already find in many biology labs, you can scan a pattern, then deposit metals, semiconductors, or DNA, and then shrink it down,” said Boyden. 

Photos: Getty Images and M.I.T. Daniel Oran


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